Robin Zeng's company belatedly acquired the matching .brand. It's a strange world. A teacher (Jack Ma) founded an internet company and became very rich, then a farmer (Robin Zeng) established a battery company and became even richer. Today, Zeng ... Continue Reading6 Comments
What’s 2-pin and why does it matter for domain investing?
· UncategorizedKassey Lee explains what 2-pin means and why it matters. I grew up being surrounded by 2-pin names – names consisting of two Pinyin words. This experience has helped me understand why Chinese companies love 2-pin and 2L domains. I was born in ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
The problem with selling .org domains to Chinese entities
· Domain SalesHave a .org domain targeted to the Chinese market? Read on. Do you own .org domains intended for Chinese buyers, such as Pinyin domains? If so, you should be aware of restrictions and trends that make aftermarket sales unlikely. The chart below ... Continue Reading2 Comments
A domain sprinkled with romance, dual personalities, and opportunity
· UncategorizedKassey Lee looks at the story behind this startup. In 2014, Lin Zhao was too busy as a food industry expert for social events unless they were match-making arrangements. One day, he went for a blind date to meet the much younger Xin Peng, a ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
Will Didi Chuxing “go short” and acquire Didi .com?
· UncategorizedThe ride-hailing service is now a public company. Will it acquire DiDi .com? Didi Chuxing's recent debut at NYSE (NYSE: DIDI) reminds me of the great move it made in 2016 to swallow up Uber in China. Now that it has landed in America, will it go ... Continue Reading13 Comments
How important are .cn domains to Chinese companies?
· UncategorizedKassey Lee examines if big Chinese companies care about .cn domain names. Many investors may assume that .cn is the preferred extension of Chinese companies for their domestic market. However, the result of my recent study may surprise you. I ... Continue ReadingLeave a Comment
A billionaire’s company cannot afford the ideal domain?
· UncategorizedIt's a bit surprising that this high-flying company and its billionaire founder use a subpar domain. What is the hottest business in today's market? Vaccines. That's how Kong Wei became a newly minted billionaire when his vaccine company was listed ... Continue Reading10 Comments
Most of these IDNs are declining
· UncategorizedKassey Lee examines how these IDNs have performed since the beginning of last year. I wrote about the Chinese IDN extensions in January 2020. Now, about one and half years later, it's time to check-in and see how they're faring. I used ... Continue Reading4 Comments
Some companies use number-word domains, but be cautious
· UncategorizedNumber-word domains probably aren't good domain investments. We know corporate China loves numeric domains. For example, 6.cn, 37.com, 360.com, and 2345.com are all owned by Top 100 internet companies in China. But how about a number mixed with an ... Continue Reading18 Comments
Taking a look at an early IDN top level domain
· UncategorizedIDNs haven't been as successful as backers hoped. One of the purported benefits of expanding top level domain options last decade was to offers domains in native scripts and languages to their users, so-called Internationalized Domain Names (IDNs). ... Continue Reading2 Comments